Musings
by Lain of the Weird
Summary: Just something I came up with. Now actually going somewhere with the story. Omg! Take a look. Rated for some curses. Nothing major.
1. Card Game Musing

Disclaimer – Yeah yeah. I don't own squareshit, or squeenix. If I did, this wouldn't be fan fiction. It would be what happens in the game. Except… I've never played the game. Beg pardon for anything ridiculously insipid I said. This was just an idea. Maybe I'll write more, possibly from Auron's view, maybe not. Depends on you folks.

There is nothing good about Yevonites, my Da always said. Nothing. The best thing you can give a Yevonite is a grenade, sans the pin, blow the bastards up. I don't know how much of that I believe. Maybe cause it's damned hypocritical, hating someone for not good reason, just because they hate you for no good reason.

…

You don't need to tell me that logic's flawed, I can read. But, good old Da was wrong about one thing: the Yevonites did invent something of value – Solitaire. Maybe you're familiar with that game. You take a deck of playing cards, you do know what cards are right? Good, cause other wise this would take for fricking /ever/ to get to the point. I do have a point, really. Just warming up to it. So – Solitaire. Everyone knows how to play the game. Put the red cards on black cards, and vice versa, and try to put all the cards in the right order, eventually. But, my favorite part of Solitaire is seeing how long I can go without flipping the first card in the deck over. It's stupid, and childish, but hey, no one can deny I'm anything else, you know? Stick to what you're best at. Me? I'm best at Solitaire, long pointless rambles, oh, and falling in love with crotchety old men, who happen to be dead. It would figure, in the great karmatic puzzle of life.

I suppose falling in love with Mr. Masamune Up My Ass was as inevitable as flipping over that first card in the game of Solitaire. Now, you know all the nitty gritty details about me, him, our so called relationship. Gods know that between the game and fan fiction writers, there's almost nothing left for me to tell. Almost. Cause if there wasn't anything left for me to tell, I'd be playing with my trusty old cards, instead of sitting here, writing to all you sillies out there. Don't worry, I still love you.

So to bring all you lovely readers up to date as to what's happening here: Yuna's being her good old butt kicking self. Yeah, she misses Sir Whines A Lot, but what can a girl do? Once you give up your heart, poof. It's gone. But we keep going anyway. Lulu and Wakka are doing… something. No one really wants to go near Lu anymore, morning sickness, hormonal imbalance, enough said. But outside of that, they seem pleased as punch. Pleased as punch, I haven't said that in so long. Not since, well, you can probably guess. But there's not enough time to go into a complete back story yet, or maybe there never will be enough time. Or maybe there is enough time, and I just want to go play cards. Me? I'm still the adorable, only occasionally molestable, blond kid I've always been.

But you don't really care about me, or Yunnie, or Lulu, or Wakka. You just want to know what really happened to the Legendary Pain in the Ass, Sir Auron. I don't know. I've been to the entrance of the Farplane once, maybe twice now, when Yunnie went to do whatever she does in there. I just can't go in. A lot of things are better left unsaid. This thing in particular. There are too many possibilities – I mean hell, do the sent even retain their memory once they leave goods old earth? I guess it doesn't matter if he remembers me or not. What about me would he remember? Don't delude yourself in believing that he's dwelling on the funky swirlies in my eyes, or my bright eyed and bushy tailed outlook on life. That's really… kinda dumb. I mean, jeeze, sure he wasn't the most chatterly man on Spira, but I'm not stupid, or blind. He would have said something, or done something, other than ignore me except when I said something. It was always, "Rikku, stop acting like a child." Or, "Rikku, you're slowing us down." Maybe I should be glad that he at least knew my name.

But I don't care. He probably doesn't care either, where ever he is. Who needs a man? I've got my card game.


	2. Philosophy Musing

Disclaimer - Nope. Still don't own a thing. And... yeah. I don't like this bit as much. I may change it around at a later date. Oh well. And again - the more reviews I get, the greater liklihood that I will put off other projects, including homework and other stories, to continue this. Profound thanks to those who reviewed. Without you this chapter wouldn't exist.

There's a great deal of confusion regarding the Farplane. People talk about visiting the Sent in Guadosalam. This is not strictly true. The Farplane is more a state of mind, than an actual place. In Guadosalam, people get to see the image the Sent mind has constructed of pyreflies, imbued with the mind as it is. It is confusing – but over simplified is roughly: when you're sent, you're body breaks down into dead cells and molecules, and the spirit or mind, is released, for lack of a better term. It's a different stage of life, a body of tissue replaced by pyreflies – human essence. Children become adults. Adults become the Sent. Those who aren't sent generally suffer mental and physical decay, from jealousy of the living. Idle hands are the Devil's work, to a certain extent. Except everyone else is a devil – you are your only god.

But all philosophical crap aside – being Sent doesn't change you much. Jecht is still the bastard he was when he was a guardian; same can be said of Braska. Me? There's a difference between being Sent versus Unsent. I'm really not that nasty of a person, but there's always a part of you, when you're Unsent, that gnaws at your heart. That's a bad comparison. Jecht will be an ass if he ever reads this. I'm not a writer. But you can feel something corroding your knowledge of self. There's much less energy for being a happy people type of person. It all comes down to the bare bones of existence – completing your duty and remembering who you really are. It's easy to lose yourself in the heat of battle, and then you lose yourself completely. Memories can be lost, as can emotion, you become more like a fiend every time you kill something. Because fiends are, in their own way, alive too. They had to suffer just as much as I did – only they weren't strong enough. Or maybe they were stronger than I, and just fell for other reasons. It's irrelevant.

Life as a Sent is pretty mundane. You carry on life as you always have. There's no world to be saved, no fiends. It's dull, but it allows for a great deal of thinking. It's a fairly new concept for me. I can hear Jecht laughing about this already, and the man's not even looking over my shoulder. Not to imply that I don't think – I do. But there is a significant amount of difference between planning for the future in order to save the world, and just sitting back over a small glass of sake and reflecting. I spend a lot of time doing that now. Not even really drinking, Farplane edibles are lackluster in comparison to what you can experience in Spira. Same recipe – lower quality ingredients. See what thinking has turned the Legendary Guardian into? A philosopher. But maybe that's not such a bad thing. There was never the time to sit and think when I was alive – and after I died, there was even less time.

Not that I regret anything I did before I came here. I lived an honorable life, honored my promises, and so on.

….

But life here is… unfulfilling, to I suppose. It's all habit. Nothing really changes. You don't need to sleep, but almost everyone does anyways. Eating is unnecessary, but people do that as well. And the muscles aren't going to go soft, because they're not tissues anymore, but people still spar to keep in shape. It is sort of ridiculous, now that I reflect upon it. Don't get me wrong, it beats struggling to remain sane, to hang on to whatever bits of life you have left, but if I had a chance to go back and live on Spira as a person, would I take the chance? Absolutely. Eternal Calm or not, there are things that human essence and pyreflies and memories can't replace. Namely: good sake, good food, and good company.

And when I say company, I am not referring to the green eyed Al Bhed thief everyone thinks I am. She failed to leave a lasting impression on me, while we traveled together as Guardians, and there is little I do remember about her. So don't believe for a moment that I care about her. She has nothing to do with my desire to go back to Spira. Nothing.


	3. Mechanical Musing

Author Rudely Sticking Her Big Nose Into the Story To Say Something Dumb (aka A/N): So here's a trial run on the story. Just to see if I can actually pull this off. And because I know absolutely nothing about FFX-2, it's just not going to happen. Oh well. Not big loss, right? Kidding. Sorry. But yes. Just leave a review regarding if you want more, and how I can make this better. You're all wonderful.

I'm a nasty dirty greasy Rikku right now. And if any one of you overly hormonal perverts reads anything into that, I shall kick you. Really.

…

Kidding. I'm kidding. Honestly. Lighten up already. You sound like Mister Dying Under This Big Red Coat Which I Won't Take Off Because Then Everyone Will See That I Wear Pajamas Underneath. I'm just tinkering with something. Hopefully it'll work out this time. Goodness knows the last seventeen times have been complete and utter failures.

Stop looking at me like that. I know what I'm doing. I'm Rikku – Mechanic Extradordinaire, remember? I've just never tried turning someone not alive into someone alive. I sto… found some information about it a little while ago. And there's someone who I miss. Someone we all miss and would like to have back in our merry band of idiots.

Jesus, will you stop thinking like that? You're worse than Brother, I swear. I'm talking about a little blond whiny kid, maybe you've heard of him? Tidus? Ring any bells? What is it with you and this Aurikku crap? We are NOT an item. Jeez. Besides – what did the big dummy do for Yunnie? For me? Don't answer that second one. You are all sick, sick, sick people. I love you, any way.

So back to my grand experiment: I stick a sphere into the little niche I carved into the metal for that reason. What's in the sphere? Just Tidus and Yunnie playing tag on the beach. Sounds kind of dumb, but all it needs to be is something with the essence of the person in it. And theoretically – since my lovely cousin isn't dead, it won't try to Unsend her. If it does – I'll rip the god damned thing to shreds. But first we'll see if the little gizmo I picked off… picked up helps any. It's supposed to draw extra magic out of the air to give extra power to the machine. So I push the button, which I painted big and red solely for my amusement. Immature? Of course, but there's something gratifying about pushing it, anyway. Leave me alone. It's my machine – I can paint whatever the hell I want on it.

It starts doing its normal machine thing, whirring and putting to its little hearts content. Machines have hearts, sillies. Just because you can't see it, doesn't mean they don't have it. You can't see the little bugs in your eyebrows either, but you have them anyways. Same principle. Almost

This is going to take a while, and only about half the buttons are lit up, so out come my trusty old cards, for another couple rounds of… da duhhhh! Solitaire. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

…

To save you from reading the numbers one through one thousand, I'll just say a lot. So I sit down and I play. And play. I'm actually doing pretty badly. If I was playing for gil I'd be waaay into the red. But it's peaceful, the little taps of hard cardboard against each other, swishing over dirty metal surfaces. And I'm getting black finger prints on the pictures. Oh well.

Finally the damned lights are all on, and the machine starts growling and clacking to itself, spitting little bits of something out. It leaves burn marks on the metal it touched. Uh oh. This is not going according to plan. Wait – the Genius Mechanical Whiz Rikku doesn't need a plan. So I do the thing all little blooming Al Bhed mechanics are taught to do if something goes haywire. Run around panicking for roughly thirty five seconds, and then blast the thing with heat retardant chemical stuff. So, like a good girl – I follow the procedures. The screaming and running in circles are all my own idea though. If you're going to panic, do it right.

The machine lets out one final Uuurp, and sort of dies. A very thorough soft of. Sort of collapsing in on itself. Shit, damn, and all those other lovely words that you can use to express dismay. I give the hunk o'junk a pretty good kick – not my Super Ninja Karate Kick of Doom, but it's close. This results in a rather excruciating pain in my foot. Stupid Rikku. Stupid Tidus. Stupid Machine.

So, having run out of alternatives, I sit back down to my game, pushing blond hair streaked with black oil out of my eyes and flip over the next card. Great. Fan-fucking-tastic. A jack of spades. What the HELL am I going to do with a jack of spades?

Today absolutely sucks.


	4. Travel Musing

A/N: So here it is. It wouldn't be here without one Bazil Stag Hare, so love her, damnit. Blah and blah-er are still not mine to command, more's the pity.

A/N 2: Reviews! I love them! They make me happy! Actually.. I don't like begging for reviews, but they do make me more inclined to keep writing, so please tell me what you think. Criticism is welcome, as are fluffy happy praises. Flames will be… well, who'd flame something like this?

…

I'm really not that arrogant. Honest. I'll shut up, and you can read this week's installment. Which I also don't really like that much, just cause this style of writing is hard for two characters to interact in. Oh well. Too lazy to change it. Enjoy, and try to ignore any character bashing that sneaks in. I try, really I do.

Zapping out of one existence and into another one is a peculiar experience, and I don't use that work lightly, though it has been receiving undue abuse as of late. But this whole yanking a soul from one place to another without even some flashy lights or swirly colors is just... strange. And it's not anything like most people assume it is. You're lying peacefully in a bed in the Farplane, with the stars, if that's what they really are, twinkling outside your window, and then it's early afternoon and you're standing in the middle of an old junk shop dressed in black pajamas under a big sweltery red coat with Yevon knows what piled all around you. Not even a bang or a pop to announce your presence. Bugger. If Jecht had gone from one existence to another he probably would have gotten a "poof" and a "bang". Bugger again.

So, lets see what the facts are, if any. Fact one: I'm wearing my old guardian clothes, and sunglasses. That's why it's so damned dark in here. I remove the sunglasses and I can see… crap heaped in every direction past my ears, with some sort of trail leading through. Brilliant. Fact two: due to lack of hate knowing at my soul, I can assume I'm alive. Score: Auron 1, Universe 0. Ok. Not bad old chap. Now to try taking a few steps.

…

That was a mistake. Good to know I can still walk, however the crazy monk skills seem to be lacking. I was never this clumsy in my previous life, really. But all in all, I suppose the scenario could be worse. So I sneaky sneak around the piles of junk, and come out in the center of what appears to be a microcosm. That's a very good word, isn't it? I should use it more often. Microcosm. But this is really just a cleared space surrounded by, you guessed it, more junk. Let's give the designer of this cesspool a hand folks, assloads of metal everywhere really goes far when you're on a tight buget.

When did I develop a sense of sarcasm? Nevermind. I don't want to know that badly. And there's the owner of this fine establishment sitting at a table, back ever so conviently turned away from me. Damnit. There goes the sarcasm again. If I don't cork it… keep it quiet, people are going to think I've lost it. Well, people are going to think that /they've/ lost it when they see a Sent Guardian walking around. Nothing to worry about.

So I, like the genius I am, instead of keeping my distance from the stranger and calling salutations from afar, I use my mad monk skillz to creep up behind the person, and peer over their shoulder. Damnit. I'm acting like a teenager. This is… so uncool. For fuck's sake. I am a man. I am a monk. I am a responsible adult, and a Legendary Guardian to boot. I will not act like a teenager. I am above that sort of thing. Really. Acting like a nimrod is an occupation better suited to Tidus and that Al Bhed girl, Sikku or whatever her name was. Weird name.

So, this person with peculiar black and yellow hair, is sitting in front of some of the grungiest cards I have ever seen in my life. They're disgusting. And she or he's loosing, which is even more pathetic. Allit needs to do is move that black jack onto the red queen, andit can move the red king down from the crap pile. What? Yevon monks invented Solitaire. We had to learn to play so our superiors could degrade us even more than they all ready did. Good old public education and all that.

Of course, I'm so busy yattering like some sort of old woman to you children, that I'm playing over the person's shoulder without even realizing it. I really have been dead a long time. Crap. As you can imagine, my playing for the person, let's call him Joe, because it's stupid to keep calling it a person, lets out a freaking scream. Too many horror shows on SV these days. Really. Or maybe it's a personal space thing. Kids these days. And then I realize that there'sa big ugly metal CLAW about two inches from my eye.

So I do the typical ex monk thing to do. Seeing that the katana is obviously AWOL right now, I do the next best thing: sort of jump out of the way and do a complicated martial artsy thing that I think was taught to me when I was still a monk. Anyway. The net result is my assailant drops his, or maybe her weapon and rubs her shoulder. "Owwww! Rape! Murder!" And thenit tries to kick me There. You know the place. Where No Man Should Be Kicked. It's a she. No mane would kick another man there. Ever.

"What would I want to rape you for?" I ask, completely disgusted, not to mention in a crap load of pain. This is ow. A very big ow.

"I don't know. And gimme my cards back, you pig licking bastard."

"I don't have your cards, kid."

"Don't call me kid, asswipe. Gimme back my cards!"

This is ridiculous. I don't have the girl's cards. So I do something that feels familiar, you know, the cold hearted bastard routine. I very slowly take my sunglasses out of one of my secret pockets and stick them on my nose, and push them up oh so slooowly, giving the girl a death glare.

Those eyes. No, I am not drawn into them, I am not drowning in them, I can breathe. That's right… I can breathe fine. You just don't see Al Bheds in the Farplane, and most of them wear sunglasses, to hide such a distinguishing feature. I see why. A war in the Farplane would get very messy. Especially one between the meanest, the Guados, and the fiercest, the Al Bheds. Stark mad each and every one.

The girl blinks. "What are you staring at? Give me my god damned cards back!" And then the familiarity of the gesture sinks in. "Holy…. Auron? That you?"

I do some sort of lip curling smirk sneer thing. "Of course it is." Crap. Is this Sikku? Tikku? Damn. Ah. Rikku. Like that man whore I met while in a bar at the Farplane.

She dives behind a contraption smothered in sterile white foam, still hissing slightly. Two crossed fingers re appear. "Go 'way. You're a result of the fumes. Right. Fumes. Heh heh heh." Wow. That laugh scares the crap out of me, even when I was dead, technically, and couldn't really be killed all that easily.

"Where is the Lady Summoner?"

An irate head peeps around a table leg. "There isn't a Summoner anymore. Go 'way." This is ridiculous. Never before has a glare of Doom failed to work, especially on someone inferior to me. "Yunnie's not home."

As though on cue, a door cracks open somewhere and the scratchy voice of someone who had been sobbing hysterically up until recently inquires, "I'm s-sorry, R-rikku. Are you t-talking to someone in there?" A hiccup.

"No! No one! It's just me and my lovely cards, Yunnie!" She groans melodramatically, and grabbing my cowl, yanks me down and pushes me under the table. Which she then steps in front of. Stupid bint.

Black boots and a blue skirt appear in front of the table. "Ooh. Okay, then." A pause. "What's that on the table, Rikku?"

"Erm…. It's a device. To shuffle cards."

Yuna ignores this rather blatant lie. "Have you seen one of my spheres? The one with me and Tidus at the beach? It's missing." Sniffle. I'd almost feel sorry for the girl, except she's crying over Tidus. Mr. Insufferable. The bottomless pit himself when it came to eating.

"Um… no! Why don't you ask Wakka? Maybe he took it by accident." The crazy wench trods on my fingers.

"Ooh. Okay." The black boots disappear and I roll out from underneath the table with as much dignity as is salvageable. I did just get manhandled by a girl. A puny little blond girl, at that.

"What the hell?" I'm pissed now. Very, very pissed. And I definitely scare Rikku a little. Score Auron 2, Universe 300. Damn the bastards.

She turns on her cute little Al Bhed heel. It's not cute, but it is very little. I got a good look at it while residing under the table. "I'm leaving." Phew. Time for some Auron try to pull his act together time. "And you're coming with me." So much for that idea. But I follow, like a good boy.

Somewhere between my ears I can hear Jecht laughing his head off.


End file.
